TO WILLIAM CARMICHAEL.

Paris, June 14, 1787.

Dear Sir,

Having got back to Paris three days ago, I resume immediately the correspondence with which you have been pleased to honor me.  I wish I could have begun it with more agreeable information than that furnished me by Mr. Grand, that the funds of the United States here are exhausted, and himself considerably in advance; and by the board of treasury at New York, that they have no immediate prospect of furnishing us supplies.  We are thus left to shift for ourselves, without previous warning.  As soon as they shall replenish Mr. Grand’s hands, I will give you notice, that you may recommence your usual drafts on him; unless the board should provide a separate fund for you, dependant on yourself alone, which I have strongly and repeatedly pressed on them, in order to remove the indecency of suffering your drafts to pass through any intermediate hand for payment.

My letters from America came down to the 24th of April.  The disturbances in the Eastern States were entirely settled.  I do not learn that the government had made any examples.  Mr. Hancock’s health being re-established, the want of which had occasioned him to resign the government of Massachusetts, he has been re-elected to the exclusion of Governor Bowdoin.  New York still refuses to pass the impost in any form, and were she to pass it, Pennsylvania will not uncouple it from the supplementary funds.  These two States and Virginia, are the only ones, my letters say, which have paid any thing into the Continental treasury, for a twelvemonth past.  I send you a copy of a circular letter from Congress to the several States, insisting on their removing all obstructions to the recovery of British debts.  This was hurried, that it might be delivered to the Assembly of New York before they rose.  It was delivered, but they did nothing in consequence of it.  The convention to be assembled at Philadelphia will be an able one.  Ten States were known to have appointed delegates.  Maryland was about to appoint; Connecticut was doubtful; and Rhode Island had refused.  We are sure, however, of eleven States.  South Carolina has prohibited the importation of slaves for three years; which is a step towards a perpetual prohibition.  Between six and seven hundred thousand acres of land are actually surveyed into townships, and the sales are to begin immediately.  They are not to be sold for less than a dollar the acre, in public certificates.  I wrote you from Bordeaux on the subject of Colonel Smith.  I was sorry I missed him there, for other reasons as well as from a curiosity to know his errand.  The Notables have laid the foundation of much good here:  you have seen it detailed in the public papers.  The Prince of Wales is likely to recover from his illness, which was very threatening.  It is feared, that three powers have combined to lift the Prince of Orange out of his difficulties.  Have you yet the cipher of which I formerly wrote to you, or any copy of it?